


Skin Deep

by rixie



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Betrayal, Crying, Hurt/Comfort, I WROTE THIS TOO ANGSTY ABORT, Infantilism, Little!Tony, Non-Sexual Age Play, Other, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Hatred, Time Skips, a lot of you are rooting for tony which i suppose is poor writing on my behalf, alternative universe - littles are known, cacw aftermath, no one asked for this but i finished it anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-30
Updated: 2019-07-28
Packaged: 2019-09-17 13:19:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16975317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rixie/pseuds/rixie
Summary: If someone had asked Tony Stark if he regretted chasing Rodgers to Siberia that day, he'd say no.He'd say some things are worth burning the world down.Tony's been pretending to be anything but a Little his entire existence. A lie, and a shield, and traitorous team mates is all that it takes to have his world fall down.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> All aboard the Tony self-hate express. Choo Choo.
> 
> I don't know what this is tbh..... It was supposed to be a short 5+1 things I started writing the moment I got back from Civil War, but like all my stuff, I lost inspiration and wandered off.  
> You might notice a change in writing style throughout the story bc of this. It's been two years. I grew. Yeet.

_“flesh heals,_

_bones grow,_

_but the mind does not forget,_

_and the heart does not_

_forgive._

_Yes, the skin recovers,_

_But I am not skin deep.”_

 

 

 

Tony lies, on icy bedrock in an abandoned facility. A mix of cold and fatigue aching his limbs to the bone, his teeth and hands would surely shudder if not for the adrenaline pumping through every capillary. 

He is trapped, stuck in a cold metal suit that had been his only protection more times than even he could remember. Now it was only trapping him. Bearing down on him. Paralysing him.

This was nothing new; Tony long ago realised that the suit had been holding him back for as long as it had been allowing him fly.

The shield - a symbol of hope and saviour for many. A symbol of redemption and resilience and honour. This shield was not shaped in Captain America's image, but rather Captain America was born from its.

 

_My father made that shield. Not for you, but for all of us._

 

The shield is thrust into his chest, it's paint already scraped and coated with blood. Then there was only pain.

 

* * *

 

"I'm sorry Mr. Stark."

 

 _Hurts_. _Everything hurts._

His head, his bones, his chest where the ark reactor once lay most of all. His little metal soul.

Hollow and gaping.

 

"There are no other options. If we can't stabilise your chest..."

 

The world blurred. Faces appear and disappear from his vision. Unfocused.

"The data is there, Mr. Stark. Would you really choose permanent upper body paralysation to..."

He knows the taste of heavy medication. It's cloying on his tongue, settles behind his teeth. The world fades out.

"Please, Mr. Stark.”

 

There is a shield. It's dirty and scraped.

  

"Tony, please.”

 

The shield falls.

 

 

* * *

 

Tony loses time. Unsure how long he was unconscious. Unsure if he is even conscious at all - or if it's just an elaborate trick of his broken mind.

He tries to make the most of those few minutes awake, anyway. Just in case.

 

"Pepper."

 

 _I didn't want this._ He doesn't say, he can't say.

He doesn't need to.

 

"I know, Tony. I know you never wanted this." Pepper soothes, cupping Tony's face with her hands and gently running her fingertips through the hair on his temples. "But we've run out of options, and I can't let you die."

She's smiling shakily through her tears.

"Pepper." It's more a sob than a word. She understands anyway, because she is Pepper.

 

_Please. I need you, I love you. Don't do this._

 

Rhodey joins her at Tony's bedside, grasps one of his hands tight. "It's going to be ok, Tones. We aren't going anywhere."

 

* * *

 

_**'The thing about SH-046E, colloquially known as Lybitrol, that makes it different from all other classification neutraliser drugs (and far more dangerous) is that it doesn't just effect the users mindset - convincing them mentally to be something that, on the outside, they aren't.** _

**_Rather it convinces the users neuronal chemistry so thoroughly that it belongs to a different classification, that the mind begins mutilate it's own biology to fit the minds delusion._ **

_**While this level of self-bioengineering is very impressive, prolonged usage invariably results in death.'** _

 

Tony tries pathetically to slam the book shut, but with his chest bound and arms splinted to minimise movement, he has to settle with just wriggling feebly until the whole thing falls off the bed with a heavy 'thud'.

It's not nearly as satisfying, but at this point in his life, Tony is desperate enough to take what he can get.

He doesn't know how long he sits there, blearily staring at the book on the floor until the door to his room is opened, and someone enters.

"How do you feel, Mr. Stark?" A peppy brunette nurse inquires, in her hands a familiar sliver tray.

Tony wonders idly what sort of food it'll be today. Pre-chewed pea, or pumpkin pumice. Maybe even goopy potato, if he is lucky.

"Bored." replies Tony after a beat, his voice barely a rasp.

"Well, that's hardly unusual! I'll get you some better reading material, how about that?"

Tony tries to shrug. Regrets it immediately when the pain in his chest flares. "If you insist." He rasps. "Cars. Engines. Bare skin. That order."

The nurse just laughs, light and cheerful. She shuffles the tray onto Tony's bed-table, pick up the book absentmindedly, and sets it next to the tray as she checks the IV.

She seems like she is contemplating something. Tony is not in the mood to ask.

Too bad, it seems she want to talk.

The nurse lets out a breath, and huddles right up to the metal railing of Tony's bed. "I wasn't supposed to tell you this yet... But, Doc thinks you'll be well enough for visitors within the week! Isn't that great?" She whispers conspiringly, eyes bright and voice getting higher towards the end in excitement.

"Wonderful." Tony croaks dully, eyeing the tray. Maybe he might be allowed to feed himself this time. If he can pretend there is no excruciating pain whilst doing so.

He misses the concerned look the nurse gives him. And, thankfully, the conversation tapers off.

The bleakness of this situation never fails to come crashing down on Tony at the exact moment he is being spoon fed his hospital mush, by a nurse he probably would have pursued back in his playboy days. 

_This is my life now._

He kinda just.... floats these days. Not really here, but not really gone either. A hollowed version of his former self, like someone scooped out everything that made him _him_ and just left him with all the bits he despised. The bits he spend decades presenting didn't exist.

There are cards on his bedside table, but he can't move his arms enough to reach them, and a single balloon in the corner, mostly deflated now.

It's blue with silver lettering that depicts the words _'get well soon!'_  

He hates it.

 

He hates all of it and most of all; he hates himself.

 

* * *

 

They arrive the day the doctors allow Tony visitors, that same hour in fact.

Almost four weeks after the surgery which ruined his life, he’s finally been declared stable enough to leave the ICU. His private room is equipped with its own bathroom and kitchen, not that he can use either, a TV – which he can’t stand to watch – and his bed.

His arms have been unbound, but his chest is still in this plastic cast thing that's uncomfortable as hell and itches like crazy. He’s still not allowed to feed himself, but Tony suspects that has less to do with whether or not he can, and more to do with other… _things._

Tony self-comforts with the knowledge that soon enough he’ll be out of here and back in his lab. _Only a few more weeks_ , he tells himself. He’s not allowed a phone, but they did give him paper; most of which is now decorated in scribbles concerning the formulas of Extremis and Lybitrol.

Something went wrong. _Very_ wrong. He’s not sure what yet, but the sooner he figures it out the sooner he can fix it and, most importantly, himself-

 

The door abruptly swings open. Tony looks up, mostly out of automation, expecting another nurse or even another doctor come to poke at him in fascination.

To his surprise, it's Pepper who enters, with Rhodey right behind her. For an unfathomable reason, Tony’s attention is immediately drawn to the bunches of hair falling out of her usually immaculate bun. Then to the dark circles under her eyes.

"Pepper," Tony blinks, his voice guttural due to disuse. Cracking on each phoneme. "What's wrong?"

Her face crumbles at the sound.

"What's _wrong?_ ” Pepper cries, “You're in hospital, Tony!"

She takes one of his hands between both of hers, and Tony suppresses a wince at how tight her grip is. He opens his mouth, but he finds he has nothing nice to reply with and closes it.

Pepper blots at the wetness on her cheeks, runs the knuckle of her index finger under her eye to catch stray droplets.

“Don’t let these tears fool you- I’m _so_ mad at you right now,” she sniffs.

“What? Why?” Tony yelps hoarsely, swinging his gaze to Rhodey’s – who just impassively stares back. “I’m in hospital! Surely that’s enough to warrant a little sympathy?”

Pepper gives him a stern, borderline indignant, look, "It’s because you’re in hospital that I’m angry! What were you thinking- running off after a fugitive, alone!”

Tony opens his mouth to defend himself, argue that he could never, not in his darkest nightmares, have predicted what would occur in that bunker. The product of mad men and friendships built on deceit – Of flying to close to the sun. The inevitable plummet.

But he just can’t choke the words out.

“And you’re bones!” Pepper continues, “The doctors said you had breaks up to four years old- that you must have been in constant pain! And-and you never e-even told u-us." She breaks down into sobs.

"Aww, Pep." Tony sighs, carefully wrapping his arms around her when she hugs him. Tony's head rests instinctively in the crook where her shoulder meets her neck.

He glances at Rhodey and says, "I'm guessing you're mad at me too, Honeybear."

Rhodes gives him a _very_ unimpressed look. "Let's just say that you're not leaving my site again anytime soon."

Tony sighs again, "I guess this means in grounded for the next couple months."

Pepper freezes and then pulls back to stare at Tony's face, incredulous.

"Tell me you're not being serious. 

Tony frowns in confusion, "what?"

He glances at Rhodey in hope of clarification, only to see the same look of astonishment on his face.

"What?" He asks again.

"Tony." Rhodey starts carefully. "You can never go back into the suit. You do understand that, right?"

 

Tony blinks. 

"What?" He barks, laughing hollowly. "Of course I'm going back to being Iron Man."

 

They just stare at him, like he’s the one being unreasonable – the one being crazy.

 

"Pep... Rhodey....come on.” Tony reasons, “It might take a few months but I'll be back on track soon enough. We don't need to make a big deal over this-" He waves a hand over himself. "I'm barely damaged-"

"Tony!" Pepper cries, aghast.

At the same time, Rhodey snaps, "Christ, Tony! You understand you almost died right? In fact, you did die. Multiple times! The only reason you're still here is because Pep' knew about that damn neutraliser drug - the very thing which was stopping you from healing properly in the first place!"

In his numb state, Toy doesn't really absorb his words. They just kind of flow over him, never penetrating the defences he's built to keep from collapsing. 

"What are you trying to say, Honeybear?" Tony says with a lightness that rings hollow and false.

"I'm saying," Rhodey spits, every bit the Marine Colonel that he is, "you are never going back into the Iron Man suit if I have anything to say about it."

His anger causes indignation to rise within Tony. "It's a good thing you don't have the authority then." Tony snaps back.

Rhodey’s mouth lifts at the corners, a parody of a smile. It twists his face into something bitter and terrible, and it looks so wrong that a chill shudders through Tony's bones.

"Actually, we do have the authority. Your true classification is now private knowledge, which means laws regarding Littles affect you. Pepper signed for full guardian-rights whilst you were still in surgery."

 

That penetrates.

 

It penetrates with the power of a nuclear weapon.

 

Tony is simultaneously horrified and shocked and betrayed and horrified, bouncing from one feeling to the next like a pinball. His stomach revolts, and he feels like he very well might throw up.

How could they?

How could they _ruin_ him like this?

 

"Tony." Pepper gently rubs her fingers through his hair, attempting to sooth the hurt. He feels patronised, but he can't bark at her to _stop_ , _get away_ , because he's frozen in shock. "You know you wouldn't have been able to fly the suit anyway. You're body is rapidly realigning itself now you're off that drug. The doctor said you're going to get smaller- and your motor control's shot forever."

 _I'm already smaller._ Tony thinks in a daze, _how much smaller can I realistically get?_

 _A lot._ The menacing voice in his head, the one which sounds suspiciously like Stane, replies. _You've seen how small Littles usually are; tiny, weak things, relying on their caretakers just to survive. Unable to do even the most basic things. Like a real kid. Your childhood was so great the first time around, now you get to live that helpless forever._

 

Tony is thrust back into awareness so violently that it's like the whole world has jolted into hyper speed. It takes him a moment to remember _who_ he is, let alone where he is, and that Pepper has been calling his name. 

"-ony? Tony?"

"Get out." He says, shakily but with conviction. He wrenches himself backwards and away from Pepper's hands, his anger making the agony that flares across his chest feel insignificant.

"Tony?" Pepper asks hesitantly, unconsciously reaching for him.

"GET OUT!" He roars and hurls their gift across the room with as much force as he can muster, then sweeps his arm across the bedside table so the items on its surface smash across the linoleum. He tears at the tubes in his arms, the bindings on his chest, and alarms go haywire.

The nurses burst into the room and, Rhodey, seeing a tactical retreat is the best course of action even if it pains him, takes a shocked Pepper by the arm and maneuverers her to the door.

He pauses, one moment suspended in time and says, "We don't regret it, Tony. Even if you hate us, we won't regret it."

Then he guides Pepper out the door and Tony's left with four nurses hovering over him, above him. Strapping his arms to the side of the hospital bed, his legs. It’s horrifying to a degree that Tony didn’t even know he possessed.

 

_Ankylophobia, the fear of joint immobility. The fear of being paralysed._

 

Tony has a lot of fears. He has fears of things that regular people don’t even know _to_ fear. But this is a new one.

He breaks down and cries, and cries, and cries, and between one agonising moment and the next, he’s gone; pulled under by the waves of anesthetic.

  

* * *

 

 

The hospital allocated him a therapist.

She comes every Monday, Wednesday and Friday for a forty-five minute session.

 _They_ want to brainwash him into believing he's gaining a new part of himself, rather than watching his whole life crumble to pieces. Draining away like sand between fingers he can't clench.

 

"Your personal doctor, he knew if your condition?"

She's an older woman, older than Tony.

Experienced, as Pepper would say.

And she's spent many years working with people who have suppressed their classifications to the point of grievous self-harm; the few that hadn't died, that is.

Tony's regular bullshit never managed to elicit irritation, nor make her angry, and Tony's so unbelievably tired, too tired to keep it up so he just... doesn't. For once in his life, Tony talks to someone who's obligated to listen.

It's both the hardest thing he's ever had to do and the easiest.

 

"Yeah. He knew I was taking the neutraliser." Tony mutters.

"He did regular physicals?"

Tony grunts, "Semi-regular. I'm a busy man."

She raises an eyebrow and Tony feels instantly chastened. He blames this feeling of meekness on his classification. He blames a lot of things on his classification. He’s ripped himself apart and glued the shards back together with blood and whisky and _words loaded with connotations_ _because of his-_

"He must have known what was happening to you."

"Yeah," Tony shrugs half-heartedly. "He told me the drug wasn't letting my bones heal properly- that every time I took a hit I was eroding my own cartilage. He said I either had to stop being Iron Man or go off the drug."

She taps the end of her pen against her lips absentmindedly and then careful asks, "And what did you do with that knowledge?"

"I remodelled the suit so it had twice the density and four times the structural integrity."

"Did it help?"

 

"No. No, it never helped."

 

* * *

 

_Ankylophobia,_

 

They don't let him walk out of the hospital (as if he could after two months in a bed, but Tony's not exactly a being of logic right now), rather he's forced to suffer the indignity of being wheeled out by a nurse fifteen years his junior.

Happy is waiting for him at the car, as is Pepper.

Rhodey is nowhere to be seen, but he's far too busy to hang around in this back-alley parking lot, away from the prying eyes off the world, so that understandable.

As Tony is no longer allowed to act as a legal representative, Rhodey stepped up to take the gauntlet as leader of the remaining Avengers. He's the one who now goes between the accords council, the UN and every other corporate body who's utilised Tony's disappearance for their own gain.

Tony tries not to think about it because he feels like he's being crushed by guilt when he does, and then he burns with rage because Rhodey brought it all on himself by helping incapacitate Tony, and then he just feels terribly guilty over again for even thinking such things about his oldest friend. It's a vicious cycle of pure emotion, and he hates feeling so much all the time.

His defences have been reduced to dust and all those feelings just beneath the surface have finally erupted into a mess that even Tony can't decipher.

 

_the fear of joint -_

 

"I'm not sitting in that." Tony says when he spies the booster seat snuggly fixed in the backseat of the car.

“Too bad,” Happy says cheerily, but with an undercurrent, “because I’m getting paid to put you in it.”

 

_\- immobility._

 

Happy puts him in the seat. Tony’s spends the ride home catatonic; the only he can stave off the panic attack he knew was eminent as soon as he feels the weight of the five-point buckle settle across his sternum.

They take him to the Avengers Compound. Because where else would they take him. His last home was blown up by a terrorist and he doesn’t have any other houses on this side of the continent.

(The therapist mentioned something about the importance of familiar safe-spaces, but nothing that’s been tainted by Steve Rogers is safe in Tony’s mind – including the whole damn country.)

The Avengers Compound looks the same as _before_. Same walls, same windows, same doors. It’s the inhabitants who are different.

Tony is allowed to wheel himself inside. It’s only a few meters from the car to the main entrance, but his arms still shake from exertion. He’s so _weak_ and _pathetic_ , and he just hopes for his own sake that it’s due to being bed ridden, rather than… well…

“Welcome back, Mr. Stark. Ms. Potts.” Vision greets amicably, floating straight out of the rooms north wall.

Tony instinctively flinches, and then ignores Pepper’s concerned look.

(Vision does that a lot; seemingly appearing out of thin air. Like he doesn’t understand walls. Like basic physics doesn’t apply to him.

Tony flinches every time, but it’s not out of fright.)

 

“Thank you, Vision.” Pepper greets in return.

There’s a lull, where everyone stares at Tony like one would watch volatile caesium during an abrupt rainstorm.

(He flinches because of that _voice_ , greeting him home. Familiar, and yet so very, very _wrong._ )

 

“I’m going to the lab.” Tony declares, ignoring them all together.

 _To hell with them._ The sooner he settles into his lab, the sooner all this _nonsense_ can be over.

Pepper sighs, long and deep, and Tony is beginning to suspect what’s really going on here. A heavy feeling of dread beginning to sink under his skin; into his bones.

“No, you’re not.” She says, as if she truly has the right to stop him. As if any of them, all of them, do.

Tony starts wheeling himself down the hall anyway. He gets about four meters before he’s jerked to a stop.

He knows before he even looks that Happy has the wheelchair handles in his grasp.

“Let me go.” Tony snaps, arms straining to propel himself forward. The wheelchair doesn’t budge.

“No can do, Mr. Stark.” Happy replies, cheery as ever.

Tony turns around in the chair and glares at Pepper, “I will crawl if I have to.” He says heatedly.

“Tony.” Pepper says, with that patient-as-a-saint tone she’s developed after years of his bullshit, “You’re in no state to be around heavy machinery. Besides, James and I talked it over and we just don’t _trust_ you enough to let you in a lab.”

Indignation sparks, bright and familiar.

“My work isn’t some privilege you can take away whenever you please!” He snaps.

Pepper crouches down in front of him, eye to eye, hands resting on his knees. It’s an almost unbearably patronising action, and Tony’s simmering anger threatens to boil over. 

“Look at me in the eye and promise me that if I let you down into your lab, you won’t mess with Extremis- or Lybitrol. Or anything else of the same sort.”

Easy.

Tony looks her in the eye and doesn’t hesitate, “I promise.” He says, with all the assurance of forty years consuming the wants of others and reflecting it right back at them.

Some people are walls, some are windows. But Tony fancies himself a mirror. A mirror that pulls a face when your back is turned.

Unfortunately, Pepper has learned not to turn her back.

“After everything that’s happened, you still lie to me.” She replies, tone stern but face deeply saddened.

The anger which resides within Tony’s soul flares. As if she has the _right_ to be hurt – after _what she did_!

“You don’t have the right!” Tony barks, straining, thrashing, in his chair like he’s possessed, “The right to stop me, or keep me like this!”

Pepper easily captures his face between her palms, even as Tony tries to pathetically struggle away, and rubs gently with her thumbs. Over his brow, across his smooth cheekbones, along the coarseness of his chin. She’s completely unconcerned in the face of his rage. Absorbed in the memorisation.

“That’s where you’re wrong, Tony.”

 

She stands, fixing her skirt in a smooth motion. Breath Tony didn’t know he was holding leaves him in a rush, he pants, lungs on fire.

“Tony needs to rest.” She says, glancing at Vision and then to Happy. “Take him to his room. FRIDAY will make sure he doesn’t go anywhere dangerous. Right FRIDAY?”

“Of course, Ms. Potts.” Comes the amicable reply of Tony’s creation.

 

Emotions collide within him, rampant and devastating. But it’s not their strength that has Tony struggling to breath; it’s their shear _rawness_. The emotion comes from a place within him that’s so brutally _savage_ ,so _vestigial, so...._

So...  _young._

 

Tony screams. And screams, and screams.

 

So this is how the great Tony Stark ends. Not with a bang, but with a splutter and a cough. Like the flickering of a dying flame, desperate to survive.

He’s never hated someone so much in his life, and, in all his years, he’s been immersed in more than his fair share of hatred.

 

* * *

 

After he twelfth time in three hours that Tony attempted, and failed, to get into his lab, he calls a brief timeout.

 

(He’d never admit weakness, not ever, not now. Not even once. But _God_ , he’s so tired.)

 

They’ve changed the locks. Literally. Along with the electrical locks, all the doors in the complex now have accompanying manual ones. Tony can hack the elevator and electrical locks as easy as breathing - even with FRIDAY trying her best to sabotage his efforts, but the manual locks are impervious.

They’re not deadlocks - they’re something else completely, and by the fourth attempt, Tony knows that without the right keys, he isn’t getting through those doors.

Regardless he keeps trying until the ninth attempt, mostly out of futile, childish hope. On the tenth, he ignores the doors altogether and starts trying to break through the wall instead. In retrospect, building the facility out of steel and concrete; great for aesthetic; bad for Tony’s arms.

After the twelfth, Tony wheels himself back to his room, sledgehammer forgotten on the floor, feeling angry and defeated and so _weak_. The door closes behind him with a hiss of air, and Tony tries not to burst into frame-wracking sobs now that he’s alone.

He enters the bathroom and FRIDAY is thankfully silent. The tears begin to leak just as he’s finished filling the sink. With trembling legs, and straining arms, he pulls himself up enough that he can force his head under the water, and the tears are lost forever.

 

He knows exactly when his body will give in; the inevitable survival instinct that forces his burning lungs to contract, to take a breath, regardless how much he fights in. Regardless of who holds his head under.

This has always been his most effective punishment.

(He doesn’t look at the mirror. He doesn’t want to see what stares back at him.)

 

Tony gazes blankly at the TV that night as the weather reporter prattles on about eminent rain. He tried to focus his concentration on something, anything, but his brain is rebelling futilely and he’s become trapped in a limbo of dissociation.

He’s not complaining; and that’s the thing about dissociation, it exists to make its sufferers escape their own fucked up anxieties, forcing them into thoughtless contentment.

Though, he does notice when Rhodey arrives home. It's be hard not to; with the way he slams the front door and stalks across the hall. Tony sits up in his wheelchair, watching him with weary eyes. But Rhodey completely ignores him, as if Tony isn’t there at all.

Tony doesn’t know why that causes panic to swell in his chest, and he can’t help calling out, "Rhodey?"

"Not now, Tony.” Rhodey mutters wearily, walking passed the couch, not once glancing at Tony. “Not today."

Tony blinks, honestly, _stupidly_ , a little shocked and hurt. 

“Are you mad at me?" He asks after a beat.

Rhodey stops and, after a moment, pinches the bridge of his nose with a heavy sigh. "I'm not mad, Tony. I just need some quiet time."

 _Obviously, he’s lying_. The annoyance on his face is thinly veiled, his hands are repeatedly clenching and relaxing. His shoulders seem stooped under an invisible weight.

"You're a liar." Tony snorts, crossing his arms and turning back to the TV – dismissing Rhodes. 

"Me?" Rhodey chuckles bitterly. "I'm the liar?"

Tony bristles. "What is that supposed to mean?" He snaps. 

Rhodey rounds on Tony with an expression that is pure anger, comes to stand in front for the TV, blocking Tony’s view, forcing Tony to observe him.

"You told me Lybitrol was safe, Tony!” He barks, and Tony suppresses a flinch, “You lied to my face, and you almost died because of it."

"It is safe." Tony snarls back. "You were just too _impatient_ to wait for Extremis to kick in." 

Rhodey laughs, breathy and incredulous, "You almost bled out in front of me and you think you can argue that the drug was perfectly fine after all? God, you’re so self-centered."

"I'm self-centered?” Tony gasps, “I didn't ruin a mans life while he was in a coma because I didn't trust him to know what's best for himself!"

"That's the thing, Tony!” Rhodey yells, hands thrown in the air with reckless abandon. “Time and time again you've proven you don't know what's best for yourself. And now you're reaping what you sowed and you can't stand it."

 

His words hit Tony so hard that he physically rocks backwards in the wheelchair.

This is what Rhodey truly thinks of him? That he _deserved_ this?

 

“You gave up on me.” Tony says lowly. “You gave up on your faith in me, and I have to live with _your_ decision, Rhodey. I’ll never forgive you.” 

Tony wheels away before Rhodey can reply. Hides in his room for several days. Vision brings him meals in silence, sending him disapproving looks when the plates remain untouched. 

Tony lies on the bed, back to the mattress and eyes on the ceiling. Mind completely blank.

 

_Ankylophobia,_

 

It’s interesting how almost all ceilings are the same colour of white. It means no matter where you are, tucked safe and away from daemons and disaster, for the first few moments after you blink your eyes open, you might believe you’re in a different place entirely.

 

Bunker ceilings are white too.

 

 

 

_The fear of being paralyzed._

 

* * *

 

 

"Why do you think they did it?" His therapist asks.

Tony shrugs.

She says, "Do you think they have a personal vendetta to ruin you life?"

"No."

"Do you think they've been planning this for years? That Ms. Potts and Mr. Rhodes have been waiting for the moment they could have you fully under _their_ control?" 

"No, of course not." Tony snaps.

"But a part of you feels that way." She states, and it's not a question but it's tainted with accusation.

 

Tony says nothing.

 

"Tony. Look at me."

 

He stares at the painting behind her left shoulder. If you ask later, he won’t be able to tell you what colour it is, let alone what it depicts.

 

"Tony."

 

He looks. 

 

"They did it because they love you _so much_ that your most violent hatred in the wake of their betrayal will always be easier to bear than your death."


	2. Chapter 2

“FRIDAY.” Tony asks suddenly, a week or so into his self-instituted confinement.

“Yes, Master Stark?” FRIDAY amicably replies. Tony frowns at the new denomination – yet another trait he didn’t program into FRIDAY; he’d be proud if he wasn’t so annoyed by it all – but decided to ignore it for now.

“Pull up my medical file.” He says, the words rough. The only person he talks to these days is FRIDAY, and even then the conversation is stilted and wary. He knows very well where FRIDAY's loyalty lies.

“One moment, please.”

Tony frowns, confused and slightly affronted as the silence stretches.

“Ms. Potts has granted authorization.” FIRDAY chimes, “File is available on the west display.”

Tony scowls moodily as he slides off the bed and over to the hologram. There on the display was his file. Name, age, blood type, all the basics. Tony flips the pages until he gets to the reports stamped with the dates he was looking for.

**_“Der Patient zeigt Anzeichen einer Hypothermie im fortgeschrittenen Stadium..”_ **

Tony rolls his eyes, “Translate, FRIDAY.” He growls, and watches and the words flicker from German to English.

**_“The patient presented to the ER with advanced stages of hypothermia, severe thoracic trauma, including a completely crushed sternum and both lungs collapsed. Secondary injuries include a transverse (displaced) fracture to the left arm, a compound fracture to the left leg, along with lesions and bruising of various sizes, suggesting the patient had been in an accident of considerable size…”_ **

Anxiety settles deep into Tony, his chest aches with phantom pain. There’s a picture to accompany the first report – a picture of him, in all his battered glory, and he refuses to look. He grits his teeth and continues reading.

**_“Advanced testing disclosed severe leukopenia, with a reduction of white blood cells to less than 2000 u/L. This may have contributed to the lack of inflammation response observed in the patients soft tissue…”_ **

Tony frown deepens the more he reads, and his confusion only grew. None of that he was reading made sense.

**_“...By the third day, it is clear that no signs of fibrocartiaginous formation can be observed in the fractures. The medial team is inclined to consider the possibility that something may be hindering the patients healing process.”_ **

 

The last report is ends on the day Tony knows he was finally stable enough to be moved to American soil. No reports follow.

His treatment was so private that Tony doubts these doctors were allowed to keep records at all.

He already knows this song though; Tony Stark flatlined on the operating table, breaking the iron-clad confidentiality agreement Pepper Potts was forced to sign the moment she became his PA. She was free to inform the doctors of the Lybitrol pumping through his veins, and then they flushed it out of his body with inhibitors and enzymes.

He _magically_ stabilized.

He glances back at that final report, skims over a few key paragraphs as if the words may have disappeared due to shear force of will. No matter how many times he reads it, understanding still remains imperceptible to Tony.

He can’t deny the data, not when it’s right in front of his face, and yet, quite frankly, it shouldn’t be possible. It can't be factual. Maybe in the pre-extremis days, but not with Tony’s blood thrumming with nanotechnology.

Clearly the doctors were stupider than he imagined–

 

Tony stops. Shakes his head and waves the display out of existence.

 

It doesn’t matter what they are. None of it matters anymore.

It’s done, and it can’t be undone.

Not like this.

 

He lies on his bed and just breathes. Despises, mourns, resents and _values_ the fact that he can breath at all.

Before he can begin to contemplate the whiteness of the ceiling, he’s asleep.

 

 

 

 

Tony doesn’t remember the nightmare when he wakes, but he still feels the echo of consuming dread and resonation of horror.

He jolts upwards, his face is slick with fresh tears and the blankets are tangled around his limbs in a way that make his heart stutter and his stomach roll.

_the fear of joint -_

 

He doesn’t hear the door open over the sound of his bone-rattling sobs, doesn’t feel the bed dip under another’s weight, but suddenly there is hands caressing his cheeks, wiping away the tears even as he flinches.

It’s Peppers voice which soothes, "It's okay, Tony. Everything is okay. Just try and take a deep breath for me, baby."

Tony tries to scream that he's not a baby, _don't call him baby_ , but his words come out as chokes and the pressure on his chest feels like something huge is bearing down on him. That shield is thrust into his chest, over and over.

It’s Rhodey’s voice which distracts, "Here, Tony, look at this." 

The blanket is carefully untangled from his arms, one at a time like you would a real toddler, and something is pushed into them.

Tony blinks down, confused, and then up at them both. The sobs catch in his throat, but the tears still flow, unhindered. The phantom-weight on his chest shifts.

"You never opened your gift in the hospital,” Pepper supplies, untucking his shirt from where it’s become tangled around his midsection and smoothing it down. Despite everything, the kindness in her touch still soothes him. Pressure eases, and he can take a desperate breath.

"You got me a t-teddy?" Tony hiccups, arms loose around the mass of fluff in his lap.

Rhodey nods, running a hand through Tony’s truly unruly hair. "The tag says he's called Mr. Beans, but you can name him whatever you want, Tones."

Tony blinks down at the bear, lashes stuck together with tears. It's fur is soft - so soft - and it's got a little glass nose and two black, beady eyes. They stare back at him, but not in a way that's unnerving.

No, the teddy stares at him with a blank sort of calmness. Not a speck of judgment in its eyes.

 

It both comforts Tony and upsets him.

 

"When are you going to pawn me off?" Tony rasps, running his thumbs over Mr. Beans’ eyes and through the thick fur on its ears.

There’s a beat of silence, before Rhodey’s voice rings out.

"What." It’s barely said civil enough to be a question.

"Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about." Tony croaks, voice cracking at the end, "Neither of you are caregivers. Sooner or later you're going see how much work I am and get rid of me."

It’s Pepper who answers his dreaded question, the one that’s been weighing on his mind long before the beginning.

"You look at me Anthony Stark,” She says, with a tone that brings back one thousand memories and one million regrets. “I've spent the past twelve years babying you, making sure you eat and shower and do the basic things that adults should be able to do by themselves. I've stayed behind while you ran headfirst into danger, watched you crawl back to me half-dead, and you think this is somehow harder than that?"

Tony shakes, from the cold or from pent up emotion, he couldn’t tell. He wishes the room wasn’t so dark – so he could see their faces.

"We love you, Tones.” Rhodey says simply, and Tony scoffs.

"If you love me, then you wouldn't have done _it_."

Rhodes sighs heavily, the shadow that becomes his hand is scrubbed over his face, "You were going to die, Tony, and on the minuscule chance you didn't die, you would have been stuck in an iron lung for the rest of your life. Not that we'd have taken the chance anyway-"

"Extremis was working!" Tony cries, "It just needed some time-"

"I'm not arguing with you over this, Tony.” Rhodey says, not particularly harshly but with a brutal sort of finality. “You’ve seen the reports. You _know_.”

Tony's mouth snaps shut and, to his mortification, tears begin to well in his eyes again. He doesn’t remember when they stopped in the first place.

 

Pepper wipes away the tears before they can fall, then slides off the bed. She pulls the blankets back and lies down, halo of red hair spread across the pillow.

"Come here, baby." She says, holding her arms out towards Tony.

"Not a baby." Tony mutters, but he can't stop himself from curling up in Pepper’s arms. His fists bunch her nightgown, with his head pillowed on her chest. Over her heart. He stubbornly blinks the tears away.

Tony feels, rather than sees, Rhodey curl up behind him, one dark arm thrown over both of their waists. He doesn’t feel trapped, _Ankylophobic-_ He feels safe, protected.

Rhodey hums, noses at Tony’s hair, "Sleep time for Tony."

 

"Not a _baby_." Tony protests again, but his heart isn't in it.

 

* * *

 

"Do you remember what age you were when you started taking the drug?"

Tony shrugs indifferently, picking at his sleeve. "Five... Maybe, six."

 

The therapist doesn't respond, looking pensive for a long moment. Just when Tony begins to think she may not respond at all she says,

"We have no idea who created Lybitrol, even though it must have cost multi-millions to develop. One month it was considered scientifically impossible to suppress a persons’ classification, and the next it wasn't.

“It is arguably the greatest medical tragedy in human history, and we have no idea where to lay the blame."

 

Tony rolls his shoulders as an uncomfortable prickling sensation creeping across them. Like he's wandered merrily into the gaze of a predator.

"I wouldn't know either way." He mutters.

 

She hums, "Yes, you would have been just a child when it happened. Only five or six."

 

 

  

 

And that, in itself, is the most telling part of their entire conversation.

 

* * *

 

Some days are better than others.

Some days the news companies forget that Tony Stark is still declared missing, months after the fight in Leipzig airport. 

Some days he doesn't feel like he's tediously balancing on a type-rope above a pit of raw emotions, where only the softest breeze could send him plummeting into anarchy.

 

It gets easier but it also doesn't.

A large part of Tony is still stuck in the denial stage of grief; expecting one day to wake up in his normal bed, in his normal body.

That day never comes. But the ache of it fades.

 

In an ideal world, a world where Tony wasn’t a Stark, but rather just a man among many men, he wouldn’t have minded being a Little.

Even now, after everything, the instincts are still there.

He wants to be held. He wants to be coddled. He wants to love and be loved, unconditionally and eternally. Simple wants and feelings that brush against his soul and comfort it with hope of a better day.

 

Most days he wakes with a hand rubbing along his back, the voice of Pepper or Rhodey coaxing him gently awake. They’ve learnt to get him dressed quickly – while he’s still passive and drowsy, before he is awake enough to kick up a fuss.

Most days he doesn’t feel _Ankylopho–_ confined, when Vision lifts him into the highchair and serves him breakfast. Scrambled eggs, toast, fruit salad, whatever his stomach desires – and nothing ever mushy.

Most days there’s no inherent feeling of wrongness that comes with the way they treat him – as one would treat any other damaged little.

Most days, it feels so right that it shakes him to his core.

 

He doesn’t know when the feelings of resentment he held towards Pepper and Rhodey fade away, but fade it does.

Perhaps his resolve is chipped with the way Rhodey greets him after work.

 

_“Hey, Tones. Been a good boy?”_

_“No.”_

_Kisses are laid across his hair as fingers dance across his sides. “Is that sass I hear? You know what happens to sassy boys.”_

_“No!” Tony cries between giggles._

 

Perhaps his resolve is chipped with the way Pepper calls him Honey, Roo, _her_ baby. How she disappears for days and then arrives back at the bunker with new stories about the latest ridiculous thing the Stark Industries board tried to do, and Tony doesn’t feel crushed with guilt – because this was her choice. Tony didn’t cohere her into doing his job for him. She has all the power in this relationship now.

 

Some days they argue; how could they not? Argument is a product of language – of ideals. Of being human.

 

It’s after one of those fights that Tony’s feeling of helplessness and anger threatens to boil over. He excuses himself from Rhodey’s company, feeling smaller than an ant under a boot, more aggressive than the hulk on a rampa-

His mind stutters to a halt.

He forgot. God, He forgot about Bruce.

He’s so used to abandonment that his friends betrayal barely registered. He's had so much on his mind, constantly, he's never gotten to stop and consider the implications of it all. It was Tony’s fault anyway, that Bruce left. He never should have prodded.

 

His eyes burn, but he doesn’t let the tears fall. Instead he uses the feelings of guilt and worthlessness to goad himself, like he always does.

 

He's still in the wheelchair. His legs aren't used to this new body, and the muscle has begun to waste away from disuse.

But he could change that. He _can_.

His freedom starts with a step.

When his knees shake and his legs threaten to crumble, it’s only shear force of will which keeps him upright.

 

He takes another. And another.

 

He has reached the end of his bed. With empty space if front of him, there’s nothing to hold onto now. A reasonable person would stop, rest.

But Stark men have never been reasonable.

 

He lets go and takes a step. His legs hold.

Another step and then, all at once, they collapse beneath him.

His knees skim against the carpet, but the burn is secondary as Tony throws his arms out to stop his head from bouncing off the floor.

 

He just lies there, a puddle of failure and angst and hope and forgiveness and _humanity_. He doesn't know if he's able to get up alone and his knees feel like they’re on fire. He wonders how pain so insignificant can hurt _so much_.

Vision's there, suddenly. Floating straight through the wall and towards him. He circles his arms around Tony's crumpled body and picks him up with ease.

“Vision?” Tony whimpers. Vision hushes him, though not unkindly.

"Did you hit you're head?" Vision asks, moving into the en-suite.

"N-no," Tony hiccups, “Just my knees. How’d you know I was here?”

“I’ve been watching over you,” Vision replies, as if that's a normal thing to say, lifting Tony onto the bench top, his back resting against the mirror. “With the help of FRIDAY.”

“You guys talk?” Tony’s not sure if he likes this omission or not. A part of him feels degraded, but fascination seems to be the forefront emotion.

Vision hums, removing a small first aid kit from beneath the sink. “In a sense.”

 

There's a moment of silence, and Tony tries not to wince when Vision inspects his scrapes.

“So you watch me.” Tony begins carefully, as Vision swipes a disinfectant pad over his knee. “Because Pepper asked you to?”

Vision glances up briefly, catching Tony’s eye, “I do it because I care for you.” He says, “Because the code of your creation runs through me. I do it because I was built to love you, in the small ways I am able to love anything.”

Tony is helpless to do anything but plummet straight down into the pit of vestigial emotions. The tears silently stain the front of his shirt, like ink in water. His sobs make no sound.

“I miss h-him.” He chokes on the words. 

A band-aid is gently pressed onto his kneecap, and Vision says, “I believe you aren’t the only one.”

 

This just makes Tony cry harder – for himself, for Pepper and Rhodey.

 

Sometimes Tony forgets that JARVIS meant something to them as well. That they all share the burden of loss.

 

Vision wipes the tears away and lifts Tony into his arms. He’s warm, which most people don’t expect, unnaturally so. His body purrs quietly, like the motor of a small fan, in place of a beating heart.

 

(His arms feel like a conversation Tony had long ago.)

 

(An everyday conversation.)

 

(“Welcome back, Mr. Stark.”)

 

(“Did you miss me, J?”)

 

(“Oh, _always_ , Sir.”)


	3. Chapter 3

If someone had asked Tony Stark if he regretted chasing Rodgers to Siberia that day, he'd say no.

 

He'd say some things are worth loosing everything for.

 

He'd say he did it for the people. For the poverty stricken countries that desperately grasped at the accords - who hefted it up in raw, shaking hands like a barrier between them and the American taskforce of  _super-powered_  individuals who showed no respect for their land or their laws.

 

 

He'd say he did it for his mother.

 

 

 

He'd say regrets not forcing Steve to feel the full,  _deadly_ , power of the chest reactor before the shield could fall.

 

* * *

 

"Mr. Stark, what's your life expectancy?" She asks suddenly.

Tony shrugs, “It varies based on the day I’m having,”

"And at what age were you when your father first took a belt to your back?"

"Probably nine… eight." Tony says indifferently.

"Okay, and what age where you when he gave you your first drink?"

Tony waves a hand. "The same." 

"Right, so let's look at the facts for a moment. You're childhood ended, psychologically, 32 years ago, and you've spend every moment since then constantly living up to someone else's standard- your fathers, your companies, the Avengers. And you've got anywhere from one day to ten years left, if you're unlucky.

Tony hunches inwards, not liking where this reasoning is going.

"Don't you think it's time you retire, Mr. Stark? Let someone else carry the gauntlet for a while. Let yourself be."

"I can't."

"Why?"

"Because- because-” Tony fumbles, which is completely antithetical to his disposition, “People need Iron Man,” He settles on, and then amends with the conviction that leveled empires, “The  _world_ needs Iron Man."

She gives him a fond smile and say, "The world has spun for a hundred million years and will keep on spinning for a hundred million more, and there are lots of other superheros ready to make sure of it. No, Mr. Stark, I think the truth is that you need Iron Man."

 

Tony doesn’t know where to begin with that.

 

“I suppose one question remains then,” She continues. “Will you die as Iron Man, or can you bare to live without it?”

 

* * *

 

Things slowly change, as all things do.

 

Rhodey wrangles the accords back under the noses of the UN; doesn't let months of hard work be brushed aside and the Avengers be forced to disassemble for the 'greater good' of international relations. He makes them listen, he makes them act, and fixes everything Rodgers shattered when he eloped with Barnes.

 

They find new candidates for the Avengers Initiative.

A woman called Carol Danvers who goes by the name Captain Marvel and smuggles Tony candy when Pepper isn't looking. A man called Dr. Strange who's an  _actual magician_. Hope van Dyne, daughter of Hank Pym who's a long standing rival of the Stark name, but she doesn't hold the same grudges her fathers does.

Tony can respect that.

Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Peter Parker, a team from outer space who call themselves the Guardians of the Galaxy and are basically glorified fugitives just fighting the good fight. They have a trigger-happy raccoon and an anthropomorphic tree, and the public is absolutely lapping it up. Their ratings have never been better, especially internationally, so in your egotistical face Steve Rodgers; the Avengers don't need you or your walking patriotism. In fact, it had probably only been hindering them all along.

 

Tony keeps changing.

Soon, more days than not, he can't hold a regular spoon or drink from a glass so Pepper or Rhodey or Vision feed him, and FRIDAY orders kiddy cutlery with matching sippycups.

He can't reach the cupboards and the knives are hidden away, and FRIDAY won't let the stove light and it's so frustrating. It's demeaning and demoralizing and one day Tony wakes up his pillow covered in tiny hairs, and he realizes his beard – the epitome of himself, a fundamental part of his identity that spend hundreds of hours maintaining - has been shed completely in the night.

But when Rhodey smacks kisses across his smooth jaw, and Pepper runs her nose along his suddenly everything is fine. It's good, even.

 

And when Tony accidentally knocks a bowl off the table, shattering it across the floor, he doesn’t have to try and painfully force back the tears. Instead, he lets his mouth fall open so all his hurt can pour out in sobs, and then someone will be there to hold him and  _everything is okay_ and Tony is-

Tony is fine.

 

Tony is... The way he's supposed to be. The way he was born to be.

Tony feels happiness that he’s never known before.

 

 

He's not always in his childish 'headspace' - as the therapist has taken to calling it. Thirty five years of repression doesn't come without consequences.

Some days he'll wake up and just want to spend hours in front of a hologram, a StarkPad, a workbench, drawing up blueprints and coding new systems until Rhodey comes to carry him away kicking and screaming.

It worries them, because he's too small to use the tools in his workshop but he also feels like his brain will explode if he can't let out all the ideas that are bouncing around. They're at a brutal impasse with Tony’s health and Tony’s sanity in the crossfire.

But then, one day, Bruce turns up on the doorstep to the Compound looking like a kicked puppy, and Rhodey is mad at him for abandoning the Avengers, and Pepper is mad and him for the way he left Tony to shoulder all the responsibility of Ultron, and Vision floats between them all; a silent mediator.

 

And Tony?

 

Tony just wants his best friend back. No amount of guilt can change the past and no amount of worrying can change the future, but forgiveness can change the world.

Besides, the moment Bruce looks at Tony, huddling behind Pepper with Mr. Beans clutched in his arms, his caregiver instincts promptly kick him into place, and they know he'll never do it again.

He's here for the long run.

 

* * *

 

At the end of their acquaintance, Tony offers one tidbit. Just one to change her whole career; to undermine everything she's ever done. 

"Lybitrol was based on the superserum my father helped produce for Captain America." He announces with an air of carelessness he doesn't feel. "Same basic formula. Same basic principle."

"Why are you telling me this?" She replies without missing a beat. If she's shocked, she doesn't show it.

"Because no one will believe you," Tony says cruelly - the last defence he has.

She huffs, amused, instead of angry as he was hoping she would be.

"No." She says. "No, I suppose they won't. Do you hate him?" 

Tony blinks at the question, so tangential to their current conversation. "Who?"

"Captain America."

 

After a long moment, he mutters, "No."

 

She observes him carefully, places her pen down on her notepad.

 

"Do you hate Steve Rodgers?" She asks.

 

 

 

Tony doesn't even hesitate.

 

 

 

"Yes."

 

 

 

_“flesh heals,_

_bones grow,_

_the mind may not forget,_

_but time consoles the soul._

_Yes, the skin may scar,_

_But I am not skin deep.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm gonna stick all the chapters together into one soon, just bc that's how I like it best and that's how I wrote it originally.
> 
> Thanks for all the comments and kudos so far, I'm glad to see you're enjoying this. I may finish the epilogue one day, but I'm feeling pretty burnt out with marvel atm. Phase 4 can yeet itself off a cliff.


End file.
